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Weekend Reflections – 2019-06-29

Innovation

Some believe that Innovation cannot be managed.

However, there is a long history of Innovation being managed. For example – the history of Lockheed’s famous Skunk Works:

“It was the wartime year of 1943 when Kelly Johnson brought together a hand-picked team of Lockheed Aircraft Corporation engineers and manufacturing people to rapidly and secretly complete the XP-80 project.”

I first heard of this effort – and Skunk Teams – back in 1981 when I worked at Motorola. My internal clients at Motorola were the manufacturing, materials and purchasing groups.

I was also learning about Quality Circles as practiced in Japan and being imported (or returned back) to the US. It seemed as if everyone in manufacturing was attempting to manage Innovation in a move to vastly improve Quality.

For more on that story about the original Skunk Works – please go here.

Kelly Johnson Codified His Approach in 14 Rules & Practices

Here are his first 7 Rules & Practices:

1. The Skunk Works® manager must be delegated practically complete control of his program in all aspects. He should report to a division president or higher.

2. Strong but small project offices must be provided both by the military and industry.

3. The number of people having any connection with the project must be restricted in an almost vicious manner. Use a small number of good people (10% to 25% compared to the so-called normal systems).

4. A very simple drawing and drawing release system with great flexibility for making changes must be provided.

5. There must be a minimum number of reports required, but important work must be recorded thoroughly.

6. There must be a monthly cost review covering not only what has been spent and committed but also projected costs to the conclusion of the program.

7. The contractor must be delegated and must assume more than normal responsibility to get good vendor bids for subcontract on the project. Commercial bid procedures are very often better than military ones.

The designation “skunk works” or “skunkworks” is widely used in business, engineering, and technical fields to describe a group within an organization given a high degree of autonomy and unhampered by bureaucracy, with the task of working on advanced or secret projects.

Not Everyone Agrees

“With the vantage point of the 21st century, we can now see that a successful skunk works – separated from its corporate parent, with its own culture, in control of its own R&D and distribution channel – looked much like a startup.

But as successful as skunks works were to the companies that executed them well, innovation and execution couldn’t co-exist in the same corporate structure. Skunk works were emblematic of corporate structures that focused on execution and devalued innovation.”

Therefore companies need to master continuous innovation – the art of executing on core products while continually inventing new products and new businesses. That means that somehow we need to take the innovation that a skunk works removed from the core of the company and integrate the two.

Here’s how.

We need to realize that skunk works epitomize innovation by exception. But to survive companies need innovation by design.

Continuous Improvement and Discontinuous Improvement

Those are two terms I learned at Motorola back in 1981. But I also learned that Innovation needed to be planned and managed. Otherwise people start messing with, innovating, on production processes and products, and increasing process variation leading to product variation.

Back before Six Sigma, and before Six Sigma there was TQM, and before TQM there was VR – Variability Reduction – efforts in most manufacturing businesses.

And of course, Innovation introduces Variation in process to affect products. And sometimes, maybe most all of the time, that’s best done in isolation from standard business processes and products.

As always it depends. But it should be a management decision IMO – and not just anyone’s “good idea” to innovate.

CI or DI needs to be planned and managed IMO. And done for perceived and/or projected ROI.

Why invest millions only to get thousands in return? That’s not good stewardship of shareholder equity. You probably would want anyone to do that – Innovate Unplanned – if you owned 100% of the equity.

Meanwhile Back at the Ranch

The same is true in T&D/L&D/Learning/Knowledge Management, etc.. We should only…

Invest a buck to make many more bucks in return.

And too often we do not. We “Just Innovate.” We just grab some shiny tool or technique and Innovate away. With very little planning. With very little management.

It’s Not All About Learning

It's All About Performance Competence - at the Individual level, the Team level, the Process level, the Organization level, the Value Chain level and at the Societal level ... or Worker, Work, Workplace and World.

Contact me if you'd like some help in planning and/or conducting an effort to determine and address the high priority instructional needs for a critical target audience. Instruction includes 1) Standalone Job Aids, 2) Job Aids Embedded in Training, 3) Training for Memorization and Honing Skills. Via Self-Paced, or Coached, or Group-Paced Modes of various Media.

Guy has served 80+ clients including over 45 F500 firms since November 1982.

Recipient of the ISPI - the International Society for Performance Improvement - Honorary Life Member Award - 2010 - for contributions to the Society and to the Technology for Performance Improvement (PI).

Founding member of ASQ’s Influential Voices Initiative - 2010. Served through 2015.

Guy W. Wallace collaborates with his Clients using predictable, visible, proven processes on time and on budget.

Client work won awards for AT&T, General Motors, HP and Siemens Building Technologies.

Guy's 40 years in the performance improvement/ training/ learning business have been focused in 2 key areas:

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I Want Performance Thinking Before Design Thinking and for Design Thinking to Include a Focus on Transfer – So Here Are Some Random Graphics ;)

Flip It – Provide Most 10 Before Most 20 Before Most 70

I Prefer the Facilitated Group Process for Speed and Accuracy

Paths-Menus-Guides-Maps for Training and Learning and Knowledge Management

You Go Down The Learning Path to Go Up The Learning Curve – to go Up the Performance Competence Curve

Guy has been doing performance-based Training Paths and Planning Guides for clients since 1982. First published on Curriculum Architecture in Training Magazine in September 1984 and on the Analysis methods in NSPI's (now ISPI) PIJ in November 1984.

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